Among all the debate on global warming, The UN
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has long been one of the loudest
voices. Despite accusations of bias and political motivations, the IPCC has
been persuasive in getting many governments to pass environmental legislation.

So when the IPCC releases a new report, downgrading man's impact on the
environment by 25% (and lowing predictions of temperature and sea level rise by
50%), one would think this good news would make headline news across the
nation. Think otherwise. Such happy news apparently isn't fit for public
consumption, according to our mass media.

The media has been even less forthcoming with the details of
another UN report, entitled Livestock's
Long Shadow. This 400 page report expresses what people who study global
warming have long since known-- that the world cattle population is responsible
for some 18% of all greenhouse gases, a
larger contribution than planes, trains, automobiles, and all other forms of
transportation combined.

The report also blames livestock farming for over
100 other polluting gases, including the number one source of ammonia, a major
contributor to acid rain. It further blames ranching for deforestation, and
ends with a slap at the massive amounts of drinking water used to feed cattle
herds, which presumably is taking water from the mouths of thirsty children.

So if you want to save the planet, feel free to drive your
Hummer. Just avoid the drive thru line at McDonalds.

Comments

Threshold

Username

Password

remember me

This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled

Have you read or heard about the recent findings that an enormous amount of methane is being released from the Canadian tundra as it warms up? I saw a relatively small post about this in Science earlier this year, but I have heard virtually nothing about it since.

I've been reading about methane clathrates for a while now. In the 1990s, research established methane releases from them as the cause of the PETM (Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum) which occurred 50-odd million years ago. They're also believed to been the cause of a much large warming in the Permian, which killed off most of the species on the planet.

"Nowadays, security guys break the Mac every single day. Every single day, they come out with a total exploit, your machine can be taken over totally. I dare anybody to do that once a month on the Windows machine." -- Bill Gates